1847年，三个姓贝尔的人发表了三部作品：《简爱》、《呼啸山庄》、《艾格尼丝·格雷》，在英国文坛引起不小的轰动。
1848年7月，为了回应文学评论界“贝尔兄弟其实是同一个人”的猜测，夏洛特·勃朗特（《简爱》的作者）和妹妹安妮·勃朗特（《艾格尼丝·格雷》的作者）来到伦敦，公开她们女性作家的身份，艾米莉·勃朗特（《呼啸山庄》的作者）拒绝同行。
同年12月，艾米莉因肺结核在霍沃思的家中离世。就在3个月前，家里刚刚送走唯一的男孩，勃朗特三姐妹唯一的兄弟布兰威尔·勃朗特。
夏洛特·勃朗特处理完妹妹艾米莉的身后事，强忍悲痛给家庭的一位朋友回信。在信中，她提到对妹妹安妮·勃朗特精神和身体状况的担心。果不其然，次年的5月，安妮也追随她最亲密的姐姐艾米莉去了另一个世界。
My Dear Sir,
I will write to you more at length when my heart can find a little rest; now I can only thank you briefly for your letter, which seemed to me eloquent in its sincerity.
Emilyis nowhere here now; her wasted mental remains are taken out of the house. We have laid her cherished head under the church aisle beside my mother's, my two sisters'(dead long ago), and my poor hapless brother's. But a small remnant of the race is left, so my poor father thinks.
Well, the loss is ours, not hers, and some sad comfort I take as I hear the window blow and feel the cutting keenness of the frost, in knowing that the elements bring her no more suffering. Their severity cannot reach her grave; her fever is quieted, her restless soothed, her deep hollow cough is hushed forever; we do not hear it in the night or listen for it in the morning; we have not the conflict of the strangely strong spirit and the fragile frame before us-relentless conflict, once seen never to be forgotten. A dreary calm reigns round us, in the midst of which we seek resignation.
My father and my sister Anne are far from well. As for me, God has hitherto most graciously sustained me. So far I have felt adequate to bear my own burden and even to offer a little help to others. I am not ill; I can get through daily duties and do something towards keeping hope and energy alive in our mourning household. My father says to me almost hourly:"Charlotte, you must bearup, I shall sink if you fail me." These words, you can conceive, are astimulus to nature. The sight, too, of my sister Anne 's very still but deepsorrow wakens in me such fear for her that dare not falter. Somebody must cheer the rest.
So I will not ask why Emily was torn from us in the fullness of our attachment, rooted up in the prime of her own days, in the promise of her powers; why her existence now lies like a field of green corn trodden down, like a tree in full bearing struck at the root. I will only say, sweet is rest after labor and calm after tempest, and repeat and repeat again and again that Emily know it now.
夏洛特成为家里的孩子中唯一一个活到成年并结婚的，但是在步入婚姻殿堂的次年（1855）患上严重的妊娠呕吐，和未降生的孩子一同去世。
作为牧师的女儿，三姐妹的境地是窘迫的，她们的父亲没有个人收入来源，家里住的房子在父亲死后也会被教区收回。她们的选择有限，为了将来能养活自己，要不断地加强自我教育，将来不是去学校担任教师就是去做家庭女教师。而成为作家是她们没有打算过的第三条出路。
三姐妹都曾担任过教师或家庭女教师一职，在此期间，她们都要不断地解决各种问题：如何处理与学生、家长的关系，如何获得父母、上级的支持，如何克服思乡情深和宗教信仰冲突。事情有好也有坏，这段经历为她们的文学创作提供了素材。
